After finishing my work today I did a mercy dash to a friend about an hour away(thats her gorgeous daughter in the pic below). She had a raging headache, no painkillers and two of the girls had been up in the middle of the night. Bless her.

Once said painkillers were ingested, we had a lovely afternoon playing. The 6 year old was continually trying to kiss Charlie on the lips - chasing him around the house to pin him down - it was very amusing. Charlie was clearly confused after pledging his allegiance last weekend to Fran! They spent a lot of time under the cabin bed whispering secrets and not letting the other 3 join in!

I bribed the two eldest with some extra pocket money for our trip to London on Monday, into tidying the sitting room for their mum as there was about 10 video shops worth of videos strewn on the floor by the two younger ones.

There was much begging to come and stay at my house (again) but it was eventually decided that as I can only get 2 extra children in my car (front air bags) that we would wait until we know when their father is next having them and then arrange for everyone including mum to come and stay. Charlie and I are staying at their house on Sunday and Monday night so that appeased for now.

Now sitting thinking about a 2 hour train ride with 5 children on Monday. Charlie will be no bother he loves trains, the 2 and 4 year olds might be interesting and the 6 and 10 year olds should know better! Just printing out loads of colouring pages, word searches and crosswords for them each to do.

Finding it hard to find good stuff for the 2 and 4 year olds as they can't read or do puzzle type sheets - any site suggestions welcome in the comment box.